TELICA MAKES WIRELESS IMPACT WITH ROGERS, ROUTING SCHEME

Telica this week will reveal a new customer—Rogers AT&T Wireless—for its Plexus 9000 Gateway Mobile Switching Center application, as well as a new call-routing application that could save wireless service providers the expense of using other carriers' networks to move traffic between their own switching centers.

The Rogers deployment is part of a multimillion-dollar contract for a network transitioning from TDMA to GSM/GPRS technology, a scenario for which Telica's Plexus 9000 softswitch is well-tuned because it supports both protocols in a single architecture, said John St. Amand, president and CEO of Telica. Rogers, a national carrier in Canada, will use the Plexus 9000 for the GMSC application “across several cities in several regions,” St. Amand said.

Telica's experience working with large carriers—primarily wireline telcos—was the basis for the carrier's decision to use the Plexus 9000, said Jim Smith, vice president of engineering for Rogers. But he also acknowledged the platform's ability to work in an environment of two different network protocols.

Telica's new call-routing solution is a joint effort between the vendor and Hewlett-Packard. The two companies have completed tests certifying the Plexus 9000 GMSC application for interoperability with Hewlett-Packard's OpenCall home location registers (HLRs), which are widely deployed in wireless networks throughout the world.

Carriers already using HP's OpenCall HLRs for call routing in their networks can deploy Telica's switch to simplify what is now a complex mesh of connections that often requires leasing long-distance lines between multiple mobile switching centers (MSCs) spread over a large operating region. The Plexus 9000 can act as a simple tandem switch/direct trunk solution so MSCs need neither the large number of extra ports for switch interconnections nor the large number of lines that carry traffic over these interconnections.

“These carriers could be paying hundreds of dollars per port for those extra ports and paying a long-distance carrier for a lot of leased lines,” St. Amand said. “With this solution, they could save anywhere from 30% to 40% on up to 70% to 80% of their total cost for these ports and lines.”

While he does not necessarily see evidence of wireless carriers increasing their capital expenditure budgets to deploy new equipment, St. Amand said he does expect carriers to invest in solutions that “drive cost out of the network and make it easier for them to support future services.”

Rogers is an ideal carrier to take advantage of the joint solution from Telica and HP because it has deployed the latter vendor's HLRs in several of its operating regions. Rogers also uses HLRs from Ericsson—which, as a traditional switch vendor, may not be inclined to partner with softswitch upstart Telica, St. Amand admitted.